Inspired by the 1985 film Weird Science, "Wallflowers" by Static Jacks is a video about four teenagers (played by the band members) who build a robot lady out of 90s nostalgia. Directed by Zak Stoltz, the video takes a darker turn when the lady that they build falls for a male robot, but is prevented from seeing him by her creators. The result is a video that is funny, full of great VFX, and that tells a compelling story about trying to find love, regardless of if you’re a weirdo teenager who loves Super Nintendo, or a robot lady who was built in a basement. We talked to Zak about working with the band on the video, the Weird Science influence, and about transitioning the video’s main characters from good guys to bad guys.

Doug: The video has a lot of similarities to Weird Science, was that a direct reference you used in the treatment? Was it something the band was immediately familiar with?

Zak: Weird Science? Never heard of it. Yeah, it was definitely intentional. The band is actually 100% responsible for the concept of this video, so the whole Weird Science thing was their idea. When they sent over their initial treatment, the summary was: “A retelling of the classic Romeo + Juliet story mixed with elements of present day, 90s nostalgia and the movie Weird Science.” They had so much good stuff in their treatment. The story was all laid out. All I had to do was massage it, tighten it, and fill in the blanks. I changed very little from their original concept. It was quite nice. But getting back to Weird Science, we never tried to hide the fact that we were drawing from that source material (as you can see on the theater marquee). Beyond the basic premise of “let's make a girl,” we didn't draw from the film that much. At least not intentionally. There was no discussion of replicating the aesthetic or making it feel like a film from the 80s or 90s. I'd actually never seen Weird Science until after I submitted my treatment and the project was greenlit. That worked out just fine too because I didn't think it was a particularly good movie when I finally saw it.

Doug: There are a lot of late 90s references in this video as well. What inspired the use of those items?

Zak: Mainly our childhood. They guys in the band wanted to create the perfect 90s robot babe to be the embodiment of their childhood fantasies, so it just made sense to construct her out of Beanie Babies and Josta. Pretty much everyone involved in this video grew up in the 90s, so all of the 90s toys and memorabilia we included in the video were things we already owned and had spent countless hours playing with. The only thing we went out and purchased were the Moon Shoes Henry wears during the dream sequence. That's it. Everything else came from the garages and basements of the dudes' childhood homes. I was shocked to find how much of that stuff they already owned. It was fantastic.

Doug: As a viewer, I start out on the side of the band in this video, but soon start to look at them as bad guys once they start holding their lady against her will. Were you hoping the audiences feelings about those characters would shift through the video?

Zak: Yes! Phew. I'm so glad that worked. As soon as the guys bring their dream girl to life, she's treated like an object. The fact that you refer to her as “their lady” in your question reinforces the idea that the band feels this sense of ownership over her. But I don't think that's particularly apparent until 90s robot Ken comes into the picture. As soon as this woman starts showing signs of autonomy and her desires slip out of line with her creators', things start to get ugly. I think it's a pretty neat twist because it adds some dimension to these characters and reveals the true nature of what most people would probably consider as a perfectly innocent relationship had no conflicts arisen. It definitely darkens the piece a bit. Also, I think our actress, Maria Tolbert, really helped sell that shift. Just seeing the change in her emotions and that desperation in her face... This was one of her very first acting roles, and she killed it.

Doug: The Static Jacks guys are great in this video. Were those performances easy to get out of them? How did they feel about becoming bad guys half way through the video?

Zak: The band was awesome to work with. I think the reason their performances are so good is that they're completely natural. I flew out to Westfield, NJ where they're all from (and where the video was shot) and just hung out with those guys for four or five days prepping the shoot. We rode bikes around town scouting locations, we did casting together, we ate delicious sandwiches... By the time the shoot rolled around, we were pretty comfortable around each other. It wasn't like I was the strange director and they were the band. We were just a group of friends trying to make something awesome and have fun doing it. And we did! We had a blast, and I think that shows in the final product. As for the slip into villainy, I probably took it a little further than they originally anticipated, but I'm pretty sure they're ok with it. There were never any moments where they expressed concern.

Doug: We have a lot of VFX credits for you on the site, but this is the first video we have with you as the director. Does doing VFX work for your own video differ from doing it for someone else?

Zak: Well, it's definitely a lot easier to communicate with myself about what I want. Haha. Much less back and forth. There's advantages and disadvantages though. It helps that I have all the visual effects shots planned out before I even go into the shoot so that I can make sure we get all the appropriate plates and shoot those scenes with the effects in mind. That's something that people tend to overlook. The effects shots themselves are important, but knowing what's going to be sitting around them and the context in which they occur in the cut is important too. Knowing how hard or how easy something is going to be in post also motivates me to shoot things practically whenever possible. The scene where Kelly comes to life is really driven by the practical lighting, wind, and smoke effects we employed on set, and I don't think it would have worked nearly as well if we had relied solely on visual effects. But then there's the disadvantage, or rather the risk of not trying new things and just utilizing techniques you're already familiar with. Luckily that didn't really happen with this project, and I had a little time to experiment to come up with some things that I hadn't done before. But knowing exactly what I want to do going into a project means that I'm less likely to get curveballs requiring weirdly creative solutions that I ultimately learn new things from. I do prefer doing VFX on my own projects though. It's just so much more personal. Oh, and one other difference is that I tend to be a bit lazier on effects for my own videos. If there's a little glitch that nobody's going to see unless they know where to look and go frame by frame, I'll de-prioritize that because as the director, I can make that call that there are more important things to spend my time and energy on. When I'm doing effects for other directors, I don't have that luxury. It's really more about efficiency and priorities, but it comes across as laziness or a lack of attention to detail.

Doug Klinger is the co-founder/content director of IMVDb and watches more music videos than anyone on earth. You can find him on twitter at @doug_klinger.